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Interdependent privacy (IDP) violations among users occur at a massive scale on social media, as users share or re-share potentially sensitive photos and information about other people without permission. Given that IDP represents a collective moral concern, an ethics of care (or “care ethics”) can inform interventions to promote online privacy. Applied to cyber security and privacy, ethics of care theory puts human relationships at the center of moral problems, where caring-about supports conditions of caring-for and, in turn, protects interpersonal relationships. This position paper explores design implications of an ethics of care framework in the context of IDP preservation. First, we argue that care ethics highlights the need for a network of informed stakeholders involved in content moderation strategies that align with public values. Second, an ethics of care framework calls for psychosocial interventions at the user-level aimed toward promoting more responsible IDP decision-making among the general public. In conclusion, ethics of care has potential to provide coherence in understanding the people involved in IDP, the nature of IDP issues, and potential solutions, in turn, motivating new directions in IDP research. 

Parents posting photos and other information about children on social media is increasingly common and a recent source of controversy. We investigated characteristics that predict parental sharing behavior by collecting information from 493 parents of young children in the United States on self-reported demographics, social media activity, parenting styles, children’s social media engagement, and parental sharing attitudes and behaviors. Our findings indicate that most social media active parents share photos of their children online and feel comfortable doing so without their child’s permission. The strongest predictor of parental sharing frequency was general social media posting frequency, suggesting that participants do not strongly differentiate between “regular” photo-sharing activities and parental sharing. Predictors of parental sharing frequency include greater social media engagement, larger social networks with norms encouraging parental sharing, more permissive and confident parenting styles, and greater social media engagement by their children. Contrasting previous research that often highlights benefits of parental sharing, our findings point to a number of risky online behaviors associated with parental sharing not previously uncovered. Implications for children’s privacy and early social media exposure are discussed, including future directions for influencing parental sharing attitudes and behaviors.